Icarus is so far away that the light from the star takes 9 billion years to reach Earth. Check out what NASA found.

Icarus, is the farthest individual star ever seen. It is only visible because it is being magnified by the gravity of a massive galaxy cluster, located about 5 billion light-years from Earth, it sits between Earth and the galaxy that contains the distant star. The panels at the right show the view in 2011, without Icarus visible, compared with the star's brightening in 2016: Photo/NASA

The farthest individual star from Earth was recently photographed by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and it was reported that light from the blue supergiant named 'Icarus' takes an astounding 9 billion years to reach Earth.

Technically we see the star as how it looked when the universe was only 30 per cent of what it was now!

How was Icarus noticed by astronomers?

With a special method used called ' gravitational lensing', the star's woozy glow was seen intensified when astronomers using the Hubble telescope focused on this farthest star setting a new record.

This star was used to test the theory of dark matter by NASA, and also to investigate the make-up of a foreground galaxy cluster.

NASA further added that these observations provide a rare, detailed look at how stars evolve, especially the most luminous stars.

Why was the star named Icarus?

The start is dubbed 'Icarus' by researchers after the Greek mythological character who flew too near the sun on wings of feathers and wax that melted. It is officially named as MACS J1149+2223 Lensed Star 1.

Astronomers' take on Icarus

While explaining to NASA, lead author Patrick Kelly, former postdoctoral student at the University of California, and now of the University of Minnesota, said that this was the first time they were seeing a magnified, individual star.

"You can see individual galaxies out there, but this star is at least 100 times farther away than the next individual star we can study, except for supernova explosions," he said.

More about 'gravitational lensing'

According to NASA, the cosmic quirk that makes this star visible is a phenomenon called gravitational lensing. Gravity from a foreground, massive cluster of galaxies acts as a natural lens in space, bending and amplifying light.

Sometimes light from a single background object appears as multiple images. The light can be highly magnified, making extremely faint and distant objects bright enough to see.

NASA explains that, in the case of Icarus, a natural magnifying glass is created by a galaxy cluster that is located about five billion light-years from Earth -- this massive cluster of galaxies sits between the Earth and the galaxy that contains the distant star. The light of the star is magnified by about 600 times due to this cluster.

By combining the strength of this gravitational lens with Hubble's exquisite resolution and sensitivity, astronomers can see and study Icarus.

NASA expects that with the launch of James Webb Space Telescope astronomers may find many more stars like Icarus.

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